A Lucky Kid
by ShinyPeaches
Summary: Rick, Daryl and Carl are on guard duty. Carl has a surprisingly childlike moment and Daryl muses on the father and son. His respect for Rick grows. Set between the second and third season.


_A/N: Because I love Daryl and Rick. And Carl... well sometimes I kind of like him and sometimes not so much but regardless, he's Rick's son and Rick loves him. And Daryl seems to like him too._

**_Disclaimer_**_: Not mine. Never will be. No copyright infringement is intended._

**A Lucky Kid**

As a child Daryl used to wet the bed.

It's not something he talks about now as an adult or is in the habit of telling people. It does mean he recognizes the signs when he sees them in other people though.

He and Rick are on guard duty. Carl is with them. The rest of the group is asleep in some abandoned cars they found by the side of the road. It was the best shelter they could find for the night and Lori, especially, had needed to rest. Being pregnant and on the run was no easy task.

Rick had said he would be fine by himself on guard duty but the man hardly ever slept and Daryl had told him he shouldn't have to do everything by himself.

Rick had almost smiled and Carl, who had grown up a lot in the seven and a half months since Herschel's farm had been overrun, had insisted he wanted to come too.

Lori hadn't wanted him to, which was why, Daryl thought, Rick had allowed him to. The tension between Rick and Lori was almost palpable, but it really wasn't Daryl's place to comment.

Rick was a good man. Maybe the only man that had Daryl's complete and utter trust and if he was having trouble forgiving his wife and was maybe a little spiteful toward her, well, Daryl couldn't really blame him.

The three of them had prowled in a restless perimeter around where the group slept for a while until Carl, tough beyond his years or not, had seemed like he would fall asleep on his feet and Rick had suggested in a whisper that he set up in the back of a pickup truck where he would have a good vantage point.

Not long after that Carl had fallen asleep, curled up in the bed of the truck, and Daryl had had to admire the subtleness of Rick's suggestion. The boy would have balked if Rick had told him to go to bed. This way he had felt like he was still helping.

Now though, Carl seemed somewhat agitated in his sleep and Daryl's sharp, observant eyes picked out the motion of the boy's hand lodging itself between his legs and he wondered if he should ask Rick if they should wake him.

He remembered plenty of nights when he was a kid that would have ended so much better if someone had been observant enough or cared enough to wake him. Mornings that he could have been saved from waking up wet and humiliated.

Still though, to his knowledge, in the time he had known him Carl had never wet the bed…

The thought was no sooner crossing his mind when Carl let out a little sigh and, even in the darkness of the night; Daryl could see wetness spreading on the boy's pants and knew he was peeing.

Carl slept on as he wet himself.

Biting back a sigh Daryl turned to go tell Rick, unsure of what to do himself, and found the other man already coming toward him, holding a blanket in one hand and putting a finger up to his lips with the other.

"I'll get him up before the others so he can get cleaned up," Rick murmured. "He'll be too embarrassed to sleep afterward so for now I'll just cover him up and let him be."

Watching Rick cover his son, watching the careful hand he ran through the boy's hair, Daryl felt his respect for the man increase. If he'd had a father like Rick…

Daryl let the thought trail off, hoisting his crossbow up and turning to make another perimeter of their makeshift camp.

Thoughts like that didn't do him any good. They were useless. Right now he had to focus on the safety of the group. Not fantasize about a childhood with a father like Rick.

When the first hints of dawn lightened the sky and Rick went over to wake Carl, Daryl busied himself with starting a fire for breakfast, pretending not to notice as Carl woke up in wet pants and had to wipe tears from his eyes as he climbed out of the back of the truck.

Rick went to the stream with his son to bathe and wash his clothes too and again Daryl had to appreciate the subtlety of it. The rest of the group would just assume Carl had done it because Rick had. That Rick had done it to cover for Carl wouldn't even cross their minds.

Considering it all, Daryl shook his head. How anyone could doubt Rick was beyond him. For all that the world had just about ended; Carl was definitely a very lucky kid.

-**End**.


End file.
